Supplier of steel for submarines charged with fraud

The U.S. Navy commissioned the Virginia-Class New Mexico March 27. The… (Adrin Snider )

September 08, 2010|By Peter Frost, pfrost@dailypress.com | 247-4744

Federal prosecutors have charged a supplier of steel and other metal parts for Virginia Class submarines with defrauding the U.S. government of more than $1 million by allegedly supplying a Navy subcontractor with metal that did not meet the Navy's specifications.

According to the charges filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, Bristol Alloys Inc., and its president, James Bullick, falsified certification documents that showed the metal parts met stringent Navy requirements for submarines.

Prosecutors allege that Bristol Alloys and Bullick knew the material did not conform with the Navy's specifications, and said those parts "were critical to the integrity of the Navy submarines in which the parts were to be installed."

Between 2004 and 2009, Fairless Hills, Penn.-based Bristol Alloys supplied more than $1 million in metal to Navy subcontractor Garvey Precision Machine Inc., for use in the construction of various parts for subs, according to the charges.

The parts listed in the charges include various materials for subs' snorkel induction masts, which are essentially passageways for air to be brought into the interior of the boat while it is submerged near the surface of the water.

Other parts include piston tailrods and materials used to measure pressure levels and calibrate hydraulic systems.

Neither the Navy nor prosecutors would say how many submarines were affected, what actions have been taken, or whether the safety of sailors was compromised by the use of the metals.

All seven of the Navy's commissioned Virginia Class submarines were under construction between 2004 and 2009.

Navy submarines are built in a partnership between Northrop Grumman Corp.'s Newport News Shipyard and General Dynamics Electric Boat in Groton, Conn.

The parts in question were manufactured by Garvey Precision Machine under a subcontract with Northrop, according to the charges.

Margaret Mitchell-Jones, a Northrop spokeswoman, said Wednesday that the company has been cooperating with the government and is "not able to provide further information at this time, as this is a pending criminal matter."

Under terms of the contract, Bristol was required to provide certified material test reports and heat treating certifications in order to insure that the materials conformed with military requirements, according to the charges.

"Rather than comply with the heat treating requirements of the (Garvey) purchase orders, defendants Bristol Alloys Inc. and James Bullick instead created numerous fraudulent heating test certifications … which had been falsely altered to reflect heat treatments … that, in fact, had had never actually been completed," the charges allege.

Michael J. Diamondstein, a Philadelphia-based attorney representing Bristol Alloys and Bullick, said Bullick "has cooperated with the government in trying to ascertain where these pieces of non-conforming steel ended up, and he will continue to cooperate."

"It's our understanding that at no point in time were in service members in danger related to the non-conforming pieces of steel," Diamondstein said.